ABSTRACT
The 1930s began two months after the stock market crash that signaled the start of the Great Depression and ended four months after the European powers declared war on each other for the second time in the century. These two events shaped the decade, affecting all aspects of life in the United States, including the recording industry. The business had reached its peak in the early years of the 1920s and by the end of that decade was holding its own against the insurgence of radio as well as talking-and singing-motion pictures. Both those competing media would prove more resilient against the effects of the Depression, however. By 1930 there were 12 million radios in American homes, broadcasting music and entertainment without charge (although they subjected the listener to advertisements), an important factor when money became tight for everyone. In Hollywood, movie musicals were all the rage, with dozens of these films in production in 1930 and Broadway songwriters like Rodgers and Hart and the Gershwin brothers traveling west to write songs for them. But when none of these films became a box-office hit, the studios just as quickly turned away from movie musicals, not returning to them until one became successful in 1933.
